BLUE LIGHT AND GREEN
Leslie Chermside stood at the window of the library at The Hut eating
his heart out in black despair. Travers Nugent had finally convinced him
that the police held a warrant for his arrest and that his only road to
safety--not, perhaps, though that was doubtful, from conviction of the
murder of Levison, but from exposure of his connivance at Violet
Maynard's abduction--lay in flight. He had consented to go on board the
_Cobra_ after dark, and escape to South America or anywhere else.
Personally he did not care where he went. Wherever it was it would be
out of the life of her who had grown to be to him the very sun of his
existence.
Furthermore, Nugent had prevailed on him to come over to The Hut that
morning and lie low there till it should be time to start. He had been
hoping against hope that he would be able to have one last interview
with Violet, but Nugent had been so strongly against it that he had
yielded.
"What's the use, my dear fellow?" his plausible mentor had said. "You
couldn't take a proper farewell of her if you saw her. If you are to
succeed in sparing her the horror of learning of your original offence,
neither Miss Maynard nor any one else must know that you are on the
wing. That little devil, Louise Aubin, would be sure to get wind of it
and inform the police. As it is, I am on tenterhooks lest she should
discover what is up. Write Miss Maynard a letter if you like, or, better
still, I will explain to her verbally to-morrow--after you have got
clear off."
"What should you tell her?" Leslie asked dully.
"I should do my best to whitewash your memory by throwing ridicule on
the allegation that causes your flight," was the prompt answer. "In
fact, I should go somewhere near the truth, and assert that it is not
the murder charge that you are running away from, but from the
revelation of some escapade which it would incidentally bring out. If
you like, I will tell her that you will write when you have reached your
destination."
Leslie had jumped at the proposition, as it seemed to make his desertion
less abrupt and heartless. Also it deferred for a little while the final
severance, though he had no hope but that Violet would despise him
utterly, hate the very sound of his name, for what she would deem his
cowardice, even if she did not believe him guilty of the graver crime of
murder.
"Thank you, I shall be obliged if you will take that course," he had
said, though he hated to be placed under an obligation to the man whose
cunning greed had brought him to this pass.
"Not at all," Nugent had answered glibly, as if divining his thoughts.
"I regard it as a kind of atonement to smooth matters as best I can,
for I have come to see the heinousness of our joint offence, Chermside.
I have been filled with remorse for some time that I did not repent of
it as soon as you did, and I can sympathize the more readily with you,
who have, I think, a keener pang than that of remorse to bear."
The little touch of right feeling from such an unexpected quarter had
broken down Leslie's last guard, and he had placed himself unreservedly
in Nugent's hands. Quite early in the day he had left his lodgings, and
had sought temporary refuge at The Hut, entering the grounds with due
precautions by the secluded garden door from the moor, there to remain
till nightfall, when his host would see to it that he was smuggled on
board the _Cobra_. Nugent had stayed in and about the house till late in
the afternoon, when he had started out in his motor car, informing
Chermside, however, that he would not be long away, and enjoining upon
him the advisability of not on any account leaving the library.
In the meanwhile Sinnett, the noiseless butler, who alone of the indoor
servants was aware of his presence in the house, was to be depended on
to preserve the secret; while outside watch and ward would be kept by a
trustworthy man who had come down from London to help in the
emergency--an old hanger-on, as Nugent described him, by the name of
Bill Tuke. Several times during the day Leslie had noticed from the
window this individual prowling about the grounds and coming in and out
of the door on to the moor. It was not for him to know that Tuke, with
whose raffish appearance he was not favourably impressed, had been
dubbed by Enid "The Bootlace Man."
And now, at something after seven o'clock, he saw this unprepossessing
ally approach the window at which he stood brooding. The coarse features
wore a look of cunning satisfaction as he came and drummed on the pane,
requesting admission. Mastering his repulsion, Leslie undid the catch
and opened to him, reflecting that as he was supposed to be benefiting
by the man's services, it would be unfair to show antipathy.
"Is the boss, Mr. Nugent, back?" Tuke asked, as he stepped over the
threshold of the French window into the comfortable apartment.
Leslie was beginning to reply in the negative, when the whirr of a car
was heard on the other side of the house, where the approach from the
road led to the front door.
"I expect that will be him," he said, as the sound ceased; and a minute
later Nugent entered the room, brushing the dust from his coat. He was
fresh from his interview with Violet Maynard in the rose-garden at the
Manor House. He started at sight of his unsavoury henchman.
"Anything wrong?" he demanded of him.
"I ain't seen any cops, if that's what you mean," replied Tuke with a
slight wink that called a quick scowl to his employer's face. "But I've
got a prisoner in the stone grotto in the shrubbery. The moor her into
the garden through the door from. Watched, and nabbed her clean as a
whistle as she was hiding from me----"
Nugent stopped the flow of self-complacence with a repressive gesture,
and strode to the open window.
"Ah, that spying ferret, Louise Aubin," he said hastily. "Well, come
with me and let her out, Tuke. You acted for the best, no doubt, but we
cannot shut young women up in stone grottos against their will in the
twentieth century. We must chance her having seen Mr. Chermside, and try
and induce her to keep quiet about it if she has. You'll have to
apologize, and I shall have to square her--if I can."
Tuke, pretending to be abashed, followed into the nearer shrubbery,
where, as soon as they were hidden from the window, Nugent stopped
short. "You idiot!" he hissed, with suppressed fury. "Why did you blurt
that out before Chermside? You ought to have said that you wanted to
speak to me in private. It wasn't the Frenchwoman, I know, because she
was at the Manor House twenty minutes ago. Who is it that you caught
lurking about--that Mallory girl?"
"It's her right enough."
"Hasn't she screamed or made any attempt to attract attention?"
"Not a blessed sound have I heard, and she's been there the best part of
twenty minutes now."
"That's curious," said Nugent, puckering his brows in a thoughtful
frown. "She's just the sort to yell for release till her voice gave out.
She must have been frightened by your ugly mug, I suppose, and doesn't
want to fetch you back again. Well, anyhow, she must stay there now till
we've done with the _Cobra_, and then we must make what excuses we can.
Of course you know as well as I do that there's no danger of
interference from the police, for the simple reason that Aubin hasn't
laid her information. I have been merely holding them over our friend in
the library as a bogey to induce him to go quietly on board the
steamer."
"I tumbled to that much," replied Tuke, with a cunning smile.
"Well, don't relax your vigilance on that account," was Nugent's
injunction. "There may be other prowlers--this girl's father, for
instance, or the onion-seller, Pierre Legros. Either of them might upset
our arrangements. And, above all, be within call when I want you."
Tuke growled assent, and Nugent returned to the library. "I am sorry to
have left you alone so long to-day, but there has been much to do," he
said pleasantly, adding, as he noted the restless irritation in Leslie's
face, "Your suspense will soon be over. It is growing dark already, and
by the time we have had some dinner it will be time for you to start for
the chine. There are no signs of anything to prevent your safe
departure."
"That girl, Louise Aubin--you let her out of the grotto, I hope?" said
Leslie. "I should be sorry if she was ill-treated on my behalf."
"Chivalrous as ever!" Nugent could not resist the sneer. "Oh, yes; she's
half-way to the Manor House by now, reduced to a proper sense of her
misdemeanour. A little palm-grease works wonders with a Frenchwoman."
Presently the silent Sinnett served dinner, and during the meal Nugent
unobtrusively continued to work the repentant vein he had developed
earlier in the day. He waxed eloquent on his own difficult position as a
man of birth and expensive tastes, thrown by force of adverse
circumstances into a social groove that was really beyond his means.
"I had not, perhaps, your excuse of abject misery, Chermside," he
remarked pathetically, "but the Maharajah's bribe was an enormous
temptation, and I yielded to his importunities the more readily as I had
incurred obligations to him. I shall look back upon our association with
shame to the end of my days."
The proper feeling shown by his former accomplice called forth Leslie's
sympathy. "I hope that Bhagwan Singh has no hold on you?" he said. "He
is a vengeful beast, and from my knowledge of him he is not likely to
overlook your aiding my escape in his yacht after throwing him over. He
has the long arm of boundless wealth."
"I am aware of that," Nugent replied gravely. "If he strikes at me, I
must pay the penalty. I must regard it as a just retribution."
At ten o'clock Nugent went to the window, opened it, and called softly
into the darkness of the summer night for Tuke.
"Have you got the flares?" he asked, when the mottled countenance of his
retainer appeared in the stream of lamplight. "That is well. Show the
blue first, remember, and then green. Now, Chermside--least said,
soonest mended. I am not going with you myself, but this man will see
you through. The captain of the _Cobra_ has orders as to your
destination. Good-bye, and may your next venture end in happier
fashion."
He held out his hand, and, conquered by his seeming mood, Leslie
returned the grasp. A moment later he was following his guide across the
lawn, and so out of the door on to the moor. The night air was heavy
with the scent of the dew-laden heather, across which they had to grope
their way, and the croak of a fern owl alone broke the stillness as they
skirted the golf links and came to the head of the chine at the foot of
which they were to flash the signals that would summon the _Cobra's_
launch.
They were about to descend the steps cut in the cliff, when from the
house they had just left, a quarter of a mile away, the "teuf-teuf" of a
motor car was heard. Leslie found himself idly wondering what could have
taken Nugent from home again so late. Possibly he was going down to the
club for an hour or two, to drown the memory of his villainy in the
congenial company of gentlemen who would have spurned him from their
midst could they have known the manner of man he was.
"Now, sir; mind where you're going," came Tuke's hoarse whisper.
"There's only a handrail in places, and a nasty drop if you fall."
The warning recalled Leslie to himself, and he gave his attention to the
steep descent. In a little while they stood on the pebbly beach below,
where the incoming tide was making gentle music on the smooth stones. No
glimmer came across the dark sea to tell them whether the _Cobra_ lay
out yonder in the inky pall, but that meant nothing. Nugent, they knew,
had given the captain orders to veil all lights before he arrived
opposite the town.
Tuke produced two cardboard cylinders from under his coat, and, striking
a match, applied it to the conical head of one of them. There was a
spluttering fizzle, and the flare burst out into a brilliant blue flame
that shone steadily seaward, but was hidden from the coastguard station
and the parade by a jutting angle of the cliff wall. For two minutes it
glowed, and when it flickered out he repeated the illumination with the
green flare, carefully picking up the empty cases when his pyrotechnic
display was over.
"There!" he whispered huskily. "Now all there is to do is to squat down
and wait. The boss said the launch is a quick 'un to travel. If the
steamer's no more than three miles out she ought to do it in twenty
minutes--with the tide in her favour."
The forecast proved accurate. In a very little over the time mentioned
the click-clack of an electric motor was heard approaching the shore
from the gloom, and Leslie, catching up the small handbag which was all
the luggage he had dared remove from his lodgings, went down to the edge
of the waves.